FIC - Moth meet Flame by whirl_gig - Chapter One
Title: Moth Meet Flame
Chapter: 1/?
Author/Artist: whirl_gig
Pairing: Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione
Rating: M
Word Count: 2500
Summary: A mystery Harry must solve turns into something far more deadly. Chaptered, WIP
Author/Artist's Notes: For govcampbell, to whom I owe an apology for this being so overdue - life suddenly became very busy and I haven't had a spare moment until this week. I am so sorry:( but this fic is well on its way now and I hope you forgive me.
Govcampbell requested, among other things, a political drama with a very strong couples friendship between H/G and R/H. I tried to grasp the "All the President's Men" feel that he was after, as well as exploring certain elements of the relationship between Muggle and Magical worlds. As you'll soon see, I just sort of took the prompt and ran with it :D and I really hope that's okay.
Also, a huge, huge thank you to rumpelsnorcack - I could not have done this without you. At all. *showers you with petals*
Many many thanks to r_becca for stepping in to beta for me - your comments were so fabulous and your gentle encouragement to push this fic along has been awesome!
Prologue
*
He awoke to a throbbing pain in his head, not yet able to crack his eyes open. He’d been stupefied before, but never by three people at once and it wasn’t a pleasant feeling; as though tiny house elves were spring cleaning the inside of his skull with miniscule sledgehammers.
He could feel tight bands around his wrists, which were pulled behind him and tied together. He was sitting on some sort of chair - not a comfortable one at that - and it seemed that, for the moment at least, he was alone. He struggled to crack his eyes open, but it felt as though they had been moulded shut with cement. Gradually, he managed to lift his eyelid. All he could see for a moment was bright light with dark shapes looming up on one side of him. As the image resolved into a wall with a window on one side, his other eye came free. He blinked a few times in the light, certain he looked like a baby kneazle squinting in the bright light of its first day. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, willing them to behave. He opened them again, and could finally see. He was in a square room piled with boxes with the repeated motif of a crane painted on them on one side and high set windows on the other. He knew this place. The place he had been running from last night, from where it had all gone terribly wrong. He shook his head, trying not to focus on last night. It wasn’t as though he’d never seen a dead body before - during the war he’d seen countless. Or, not countless exactly; he knew they had all been listed, named and numbered with the ministry and he knew the number wasn’t infinite; but when some of those people were your friends or people you had seen every day, the number ceased to matter. There was only pain, and memories, and death, so much death it seemed to sink into the very stones of Hogwarts, and he didn’t want to remember any of it.
A door slammed open behind him and he jerked his head around but that only resulted in a stab of pain in his neck and he heard laughter behind him.
“Well, well well. Sleeping beauty has finally awoken. And how do you feel this morning?”
“Could do with a coffee actually,” he tried to say in his usual drawl. He was shocked to hear his voice sounding hoarse and scratchy. He cleared his throat.
‘You’ll get your coffee,” came the voice from behind him. “You’ll get everything you want, if you help me out with one tiny little thing.”
He considered this for a moment, casting a glance down at his bound legs.
“Alright,” he said dryly. “What can I do for you?”
He heard footsteps behind him and the man finally came into view, large and hulking and someone he didn’t recognise. He leered down at him. “That’s the spirit. Tell me, do you still keep in contact with the Experiri?”
*
Harry sighed as he sifted through the parchment littering his desk. This was the part of being an Auror he had no time for; or rather, the part that forced him to put in overtime. He tapped his quill idly against the parchment, looking around his cubicle for something else to do. At this point he would even settle for a visit from Williamson to tell him to get a move on with those papers, just to give him something else to look at. That wasn’t likely though. Knock off had been an hour ago and he was the only person now left in the office. He mulled over that depressing point for a moment, thinking longingly of home and curling up on the couch with Gin, fresh from a shower after her training session with her hair smelling like the stuff out of the shampoo bottle mixed with something very Ginny, her soft warmth pressed against him and - a knock sounded somewhere to his left and Harry glanced up, confused.
Seeing no one, a smile crept onto his face. Thinking (or rather hoping) that it might be Ginny, he sat up a little straighter, attempting to organise his desk into something more pleasing to the eye so she wouldn’t give him that look, and called out a hello.
No reply came. Puzzled, Harry stood up, pushing back his chair as he did so. He grabbed his wand off his desk and hurried out of his cubicle. No-one. He spun around and nearly tripped as his feet caught something. He glanced down and saw a thick parchment envelope at his feet just beside the entrance to his cubicle. It was marked Harry Potter.
Harry glanced around again as he drew out his wand but there was no sign of anyone and he had the feeling whoever had left this here didn’t want to be found. Bending over, he ran through a list of reveal spells in his mind.
The envelope lay there silently as streak after streak of light hit it, the letters illuminated over and over again in the darkening office as Harry tested the envelope for any danger. Harry stared at the envelope, mystified. It stared back at him, black ink spelling out his name and reminding Harry of the old Hogwarts letters. Maybe it was that familiarity that made him decide it seemed safe enough to open, but something made Harry pick it off the floor and sit down heavily in his chair, slitting the envelope open with his wand as he did so. Several large white pieces of card fell out and Harry picked the first one up and turned it over.
It was a photograph of a man lying on the floor of what looked like some sort of factory; Harry could see stairs in the background with a long railing extending along its length, but he wasn’t focused on that. The man was lying face up in what looked like a pool of his own blood. His throat had been slit open and the blood was a deep red against the shocking white of his skin. Harry gasped in shock and dropped the photo. He didn’t know the man but the brutality of the image disturbed him. At least avada kedavra was clean. He leafed through the next few cards; all photographs, four different men, all killed in the same way in what looked like the same place.
Harry gulped. Well, he thought to himself. I guess it’s more interesting than paperwork.
*
‘So, you’re saying someone got in here, the Auror office,’ Ron’s voice was slightly disbelieving as he continued, ‘Dropped these papers and left, all without you noticing?’
Harry looked up at Ron over his coffee, bleary eyed and grumpy.
‘That wasn’t actually the point of the story.’
Ron shrugged and grinned at him. ‘Just saying, it seems like someone might be losing their touch.’
Harry glared at him some more, but the glare wasn’t very effective when backed by less than four hours sleep.
‘What did Ginny say?’
Harry rubbed his face in exhaustion. ‘Uh, she got home late last night. Some party thing she had to go to which I was meant to go too but then I had to work late and,’ he trailed off, too tired to explain it to Ron. Ron looked sympathetic.
‘I know what you mean, Hermione’s hardly home these days.’
‘Hmmph,’ Harry shrugged noncommittally.
‘You shown the Hits yet?’ Ron asked, referring to the Hit Wizard department.
‘Yeah, I’ve got Jones working on it. He reckons it’s Dark arts stuff though, from the way they’ve been killed, so he’s not confident he’ll find anything and if he does he’ll have to pass it straight back to me. I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do about it. I mean, I have nothing - no names, no traces whatsoever on who took the photos, where they’re from, nothing. I don’t even know when this happened, or even if this happened. Could even be a threat.’
Ron’s mouth twisted in that way it did when he was trying to work out a tricky problem - it was a habit he had picked up from Hermione and Harry had to hide a smile when he saw it.
‘Whoever it was that sent this to you they wanted you to know about it. So either, they hate you and it’s a threat, or they trust you enough to have chosen you to be the person to work this out. ‘
Harry groaned and slumped over his desk, head in his arms. ‘ Merlin, I hate being Harry Potter sometimes.’
Ron grinned at him and sipped his coffee. ‘Rather you than me, mate.’
*
Two days later, Harry was sitting at his desk, staring blankly at the photographs as he tried to sift through everything he knew about this case in his mind. It didn’t take long.
‘Potter!’
He jerked his head up, startled.
‘Yes sir?’
Williamson was striding toward him, huge legs swallowing up the floor as people all over the office bent their heads over their desks, scratching furiously with a quill and trying to look busy as their boss approached.
‘Potter,’ Williamson said again when he was next to the desk. ‘You’ve got a call.’
‘Sorry sir?’
‘He’s in one of the calling floos. Said he wanted to talk to you’
‘Who did?’
‘It’s anonymous.’
Harry looked back down at the photos, mind whirring. ‘Is that even possible?’
Williamson ignored him, turning smartly on a huge heel and walking out of the office with the assumption that Harry would follow. Harry started to his feet, scrambling to pick up the photographs as he went. Following in Williamson’s wake he caught a few sympathetic glances from his workmates. They might have thought he was in for a dressing down - it wouldn’t be the first time. Williamson had been hard on Harry when he’d first joined up, and it had taken Harry a while to warm up to the older man. After having lost so many friends in the war, Williamson seemed determined to make life difficult for the several new recruits who had signed up along with Harry.
Harry entered the Floo room and saw the wall mounted fireplaces designed especially for floo calls set into the back wall. They were a little bit like public phone boxes, Harry supposed, with each one separated from the next by soundproofed wooden partitions. Harry didn’t know who had come up with the idea of placing the call fireplaces at eye level but whoever it was, he loved them. The shock of putting your head in the flames was bad enough but the cramp in your legs was a killer.
‘Second on the left’, Williamson gestured towards the wall before backing away. ‘And come see me after you’re done.’
Harry nodded and headed towards the fireplace Williamson had indicated. The flames were roaring their customary green as Harry neared but he stopped, confused.
‘Sir?’ He called out.
Williamson popped his head around the corner.
‘There’s no-one there.’
Williamson looked from Harry to the flames and rolled his eyes.
‘It’s anonymous. Charmed on their end to protect privacy. Simple to do once you know how. He’s there, trust me.’
Sighing and stepping into the box containing the fireplace, Harry glanced left and right before coughing. ‘Erm. Hello?’
‘Potter?’ Came an answering voice. Harry couldn’t place the voice; nothing about it was familiar to him.
‘Er-’ Harry began but was cut off by a laugh from the flames.
‘Eloquent as ever, I hear. So you received my package?
‘If you’re talking about the envelope, I got it, yes.’
‘Figured it out yet?’
‘Not everything,’ Harry’s voice was dry. ‘Like who you are, and who those men in the pictures are, and why you think it’s my responsibility to figure it out for you.’
The voice from the fire changed suddenly, became harsher somehow.
‘Who I am is someone who-’ The voice paused for a moment, and Harry wondered if whatever he was saying was difficult for him to say, ‘-someone who needs your help and as for who those men are-’ Here he paused , and Harry thought he might have been smiling as he spoke the next words.
‘It might be worthwhile paying a visit to the Quick and the Dead.’
Harry‘s face contorted. ‘Seriously? That place?’
‘I hear it’s all the rage.’
‘Are you going to tell me who you are?
There was a noise like a plug being pulled from a drain, and the fire turned red.
Harry sighed. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately. ‘I’ll take that as a no,’ he said to the empty box before stepping out. He made his way to Williamson’s office, more confused now than ever.
‘Now,’ Williamson said. ‘Want to tell me what that was all about?’
*
‘You’re going to the Quick and the Dead?’ Ginny’s voice was dry with amusement as she took in her husband’s worried face as he searched through their closet.
‘Yes. I’m going, and so is Ron because Williamson seems to think it might be important. He’s had the photographs sent down to MEAT’, Harry said as he pulled out another set of robes, shaking his head, ‘and we’re getting the report back tomorrow. Then Saturday I’m going.’
‘And you don’t have a thing to wear,’ Ginny teased as she came up behind him, linking her arms around his waist. Harry’s hands dropped automatically to hers, rubbing her thumb absently as he kept his eyes on the closet, unseeing. Ginny knew he wasn’t totally here, with her, right at this moment.
It wasn’t easy, loving Harry Potter. He was so entirely unselfish that he rarely gave in to moments where he could completely and utterly forget about the world and how much it needed him - but when he did give in, in those moments when Harry was really and truly hers and hers alone, the force of it would crash down on her and she would gasp from the intensity of it.
Right now wasn’t one of those moments. Right now Harry was pouting, and he needed her.
‘Well, it just so happens that my team and I are having drinks on Saturday night at Quick.’
‘Quick?’ Harry twisted around to see her, eyebrows raised.
‘It’s what the cool kids call it,’ Ginny smirked, winking at him. ‘I can be there to save you in case rabid man-who-lived fans mob you and blow your cover.’
Harry’s eyes widened and a smile began to play around his lips.
‘You know,’ he said, slipping his hands further down her waist, ‘I think I saw some of those rabid fans outside trying to force their way in.’ Harry leaned in towards her, voice low and his breath touching her lips. ‘I might need some saving right now.’
Ginny grinned and reached up to lace her hands around his neck. It wasn’t easy, loving Harry Potter, but she thought she was up to the challenge.
Chapter: 1/?
Author/Artist: whirl_gig
Pairing: Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione
Rating: M
Word Count: 2500
Summary: A mystery Harry must solve turns into something far more deadly. Chaptered, WIP
Author/Artist's Notes: For govcampbell, to whom I owe an apology for this being so overdue - life suddenly became very busy and I haven't had a spare moment until this week. I am so sorry:( but this fic is well on its way now and I hope you forgive me.
Govcampbell requested, among other things, a political drama with a very strong couples friendship between H/G and R/H. I tried to grasp the "All the President's Men" feel that he was after, as well as exploring certain elements of the relationship between Muggle and Magical worlds. As you'll soon see, I just sort of took the prompt and ran with it :D and I really hope that's okay.
Also, a huge, huge thank you to rumpelsnorcack - I could not have done this without you. At all. *showers you with petals*
Many many thanks to r_becca for stepping in to beta for me - your comments were so fabulous and your gentle encouragement to push this fic along has been awesome!
Prologue
*
He awoke to a throbbing pain in his head, not yet able to crack his eyes open. He’d been stupefied before, but never by three people at once and it wasn’t a pleasant feeling; as though tiny house elves were spring cleaning the inside of his skull with miniscule sledgehammers.
He could feel tight bands around his wrists, which were pulled behind him and tied together. He was sitting on some sort of chair - not a comfortable one at that - and it seemed that, for the moment at least, he was alone. He struggled to crack his eyes open, but it felt as though they had been moulded shut with cement. Gradually, he managed to lift his eyelid. All he could see for a moment was bright light with dark shapes looming up on one side of him. As the image resolved into a wall with a window on one side, his other eye came free. He blinked a few times in the light, certain he looked like a baby kneazle squinting in the bright light of its first day. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, willing them to behave. He opened them again, and could finally see. He was in a square room piled with boxes with the repeated motif of a crane painted on them on one side and high set windows on the other. He knew this place. The place he had been running from last night, from where it had all gone terribly wrong. He shook his head, trying not to focus on last night. It wasn’t as though he’d never seen a dead body before - during the war he’d seen countless. Or, not countless exactly; he knew they had all been listed, named and numbered with the ministry and he knew the number wasn’t infinite; but when some of those people were your friends or people you had seen every day, the number ceased to matter. There was only pain, and memories, and death, so much death it seemed to sink into the very stones of Hogwarts, and he didn’t want to remember any of it.
A door slammed open behind him and he jerked his head around but that only resulted in a stab of pain in his neck and he heard laughter behind him.
“Well, well well. Sleeping beauty has finally awoken. And how do you feel this morning?”
“Could do with a coffee actually,” he tried to say in his usual drawl. He was shocked to hear his voice sounding hoarse and scratchy. He cleared his throat.
‘You’ll get your coffee,” came the voice from behind him. “You’ll get everything you want, if you help me out with one tiny little thing.”
He considered this for a moment, casting a glance down at his bound legs.
“Alright,” he said dryly. “What can I do for you?”
He heard footsteps behind him and the man finally came into view, large and hulking and someone he didn’t recognise. He leered down at him. “That’s the spirit. Tell me, do you still keep in contact with the Experiri?”
*
Harry sighed as he sifted through the parchment littering his desk. This was the part of being an Auror he had no time for; or rather, the part that forced him to put in overtime. He tapped his quill idly against the parchment, looking around his cubicle for something else to do. At this point he would even settle for a visit from Williamson to tell him to get a move on with those papers, just to give him something else to look at. That wasn’t likely though. Knock off had been an hour ago and he was the only person now left in the office. He mulled over that depressing point for a moment, thinking longingly of home and curling up on the couch with Gin, fresh from a shower after her training session with her hair smelling like the stuff out of the shampoo bottle mixed with something very Ginny, her soft warmth pressed against him and - a knock sounded somewhere to his left and Harry glanced up, confused.
Seeing no one, a smile crept onto his face. Thinking (or rather hoping) that it might be Ginny, he sat up a little straighter, attempting to organise his desk into something more pleasing to the eye so she wouldn’t give him that look, and called out a hello.
No reply came. Puzzled, Harry stood up, pushing back his chair as he did so. He grabbed his wand off his desk and hurried out of his cubicle. No-one. He spun around and nearly tripped as his feet caught something. He glanced down and saw a thick parchment envelope at his feet just beside the entrance to his cubicle. It was marked Harry Potter.
Harry glanced around again as he drew out his wand but there was no sign of anyone and he had the feeling whoever had left this here didn’t want to be found. Bending over, he ran through a list of reveal spells in his mind.
The envelope lay there silently as streak after streak of light hit it, the letters illuminated over and over again in the darkening office as Harry tested the envelope for any danger. Harry stared at the envelope, mystified. It stared back at him, black ink spelling out his name and reminding Harry of the old Hogwarts letters. Maybe it was that familiarity that made him decide it seemed safe enough to open, but something made Harry pick it off the floor and sit down heavily in his chair, slitting the envelope open with his wand as he did so. Several large white pieces of card fell out and Harry picked the first one up and turned it over.
It was a photograph of a man lying on the floor of what looked like some sort of factory; Harry could see stairs in the background with a long railing extending along its length, but he wasn’t focused on that. The man was lying face up in what looked like a pool of his own blood. His throat had been slit open and the blood was a deep red against the shocking white of his skin. Harry gasped in shock and dropped the photo. He didn’t know the man but the brutality of the image disturbed him. At least avada kedavra was clean. He leafed through the next few cards; all photographs, four different men, all killed in the same way in what looked like the same place.
Harry gulped. Well, he thought to himself. I guess it’s more interesting than paperwork.
*
‘So, you’re saying someone got in here, the Auror office,’ Ron’s voice was slightly disbelieving as he continued, ‘Dropped these papers and left, all without you noticing?’
Harry looked up at Ron over his coffee, bleary eyed and grumpy.
‘That wasn’t actually the point of the story.’
Ron shrugged and grinned at him. ‘Just saying, it seems like someone might be losing their touch.’
Harry glared at him some more, but the glare wasn’t very effective when backed by less than four hours sleep.
‘What did Ginny say?’
Harry rubbed his face in exhaustion. ‘Uh, she got home late last night. Some party thing she had to go to which I was meant to go too but then I had to work late and,’ he trailed off, too tired to explain it to Ron. Ron looked sympathetic.
‘I know what you mean, Hermione’s hardly home these days.’
‘Hmmph,’ Harry shrugged noncommittally.
‘You shown the Hits yet?’ Ron asked, referring to the Hit Wizard department.
‘Yeah, I’ve got Jones working on it. He reckons it’s Dark arts stuff though, from the way they’ve been killed, so he’s not confident he’ll find anything and if he does he’ll have to pass it straight back to me. I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do about it. I mean, I have nothing - no names, no traces whatsoever on who took the photos, where they’re from, nothing. I don’t even know when this happened, or even if this happened. Could even be a threat.’
Ron’s mouth twisted in that way it did when he was trying to work out a tricky problem - it was a habit he had picked up from Hermione and Harry had to hide a smile when he saw it.
‘Whoever it was that sent this to you they wanted you to know about it. So either, they hate you and it’s a threat, or they trust you enough to have chosen you to be the person to work this out. ‘
Harry groaned and slumped over his desk, head in his arms. ‘ Merlin, I hate being Harry Potter sometimes.’
Ron grinned at him and sipped his coffee. ‘Rather you than me, mate.’
*
Two days later, Harry was sitting at his desk, staring blankly at the photographs as he tried to sift through everything he knew about this case in his mind. It didn’t take long.
‘Potter!’
He jerked his head up, startled.
‘Yes sir?’
Williamson was striding toward him, huge legs swallowing up the floor as people all over the office bent their heads over their desks, scratching furiously with a quill and trying to look busy as their boss approached.
‘Potter,’ Williamson said again when he was next to the desk. ‘You’ve got a call.’
‘Sorry sir?’
‘He’s in one of the calling floos. Said he wanted to talk to you’
‘Who did?’
‘It’s anonymous.’
Harry looked back down at the photos, mind whirring. ‘Is that even possible?’
Williamson ignored him, turning smartly on a huge heel and walking out of the office with the assumption that Harry would follow. Harry started to his feet, scrambling to pick up the photographs as he went. Following in Williamson’s wake he caught a few sympathetic glances from his workmates. They might have thought he was in for a dressing down - it wouldn’t be the first time. Williamson had been hard on Harry when he’d first joined up, and it had taken Harry a while to warm up to the older man. After having lost so many friends in the war, Williamson seemed determined to make life difficult for the several new recruits who had signed up along with Harry.
Harry entered the Floo room and saw the wall mounted fireplaces designed especially for floo calls set into the back wall. They were a little bit like public phone boxes, Harry supposed, with each one separated from the next by soundproofed wooden partitions. Harry didn’t know who had come up with the idea of placing the call fireplaces at eye level but whoever it was, he loved them. The shock of putting your head in the flames was bad enough but the cramp in your legs was a killer.
‘Second on the left’, Williamson gestured towards the wall before backing away. ‘And come see me after you’re done.’
Harry nodded and headed towards the fireplace Williamson had indicated. The flames were roaring their customary green as Harry neared but he stopped, confused.
‘Sir?’ He called out.
Williamson popped his head around the corner.
‘There’s no-one there.’
Williamson looked from Harry to the flames and rolled his eyes.
‘It’s anonymous. Charmed on their end to protect privacy. Simple to do once you know how. He’s there, trust me.’
Sighing and stepping into the box containing the fireplace, Harry glanced left and right before coughing. ‘Erm. Hello?’
‘Potter?’ Came an answering voice. Harry couldn’t place the voice; nothing about it was familiar to him.
‘Er-’ Harry began but was cut off by a laugh from the flames.
‘Eloquent as ever, I hear. So you received my package?
‘If you’re talking about the envelope, I got it, yes.’
‘Figured it out yet?’
‘Not everything,’ Harry’s voice was dry. ‘Like who you are, and who those men in the pictures are, and why you think it’s my responsibility to figure it out for you.’
The voice from the fire changed suddenly, became harsher somehow.
‘Who I am is someone who-’ The voice paused for a moment, and Harry wondered if whatever he was saying was difficult for him to say, ‘-someone who needs your help and as for who those men are-’ Here he paused , and Harry thought he might have been smiling as he spoke the next words.
‘It might be worthwhile paying a visit to the Quick and the Dead.’
Harry‘s face contorted. ‘Seriously? That place?’
‘I hear it’s all the rage.’
‘Are you going to tell me who you are?
There was a noise like a plug being pulled from a drain, and the fire turned red.
Harry sighed. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately. ‘I’ll take that as a no,’ he said to the empty box before stepping out. He made his way to Williamson’s office, more confused now than ever.
‘Now,’ Williamson said. ‘Want to tell me what that was all about?’
*
‘You’re going to the Quick and the Dead?’ Ginny’s voice was dry with amusement as she took in her husband’s worried face as he searched through their closet.
‘Yes. I’m going, and so is Ron because Williamson seems to think it might be important. He’s had the photographs sent down to MEAT’, Harry said as he pulled out another set of robes, shaking his head, ‘and we’re getting the report back tomorrow. Then Saturday I’m going.’
‘And you don’t have a thing to wear,’ Ginny teased as she came up behind him, linking her arms around his waist. Harry’s hands dropped automatically to hers, rubbing her thumb absently as he kept his eyes on the closet, unseeing. Ginny knew he wasn’t totally here, with her, right at this moment.
It wasn’t easy, loving Harry Potter. He was so entirely unselfish that he rarely gave in to moments where he could completely and utterly forget about the world and how much it needed him - but when he did give in, in those moments when Harry was really and truly hers and hers alone, the force of it would crash down on her and she would gasp from the intensity of it.
Right now wasn’t one of those moments. Right now Harry was pouting, and he needed her.
‘Well, it just so happens that my team and I are having drinks on Saturday night at Quick.’
‘Quick?’ Harry twisted around to see her, eyebrows raised.
‘It’s what the cool kids call it,’ Ginny smirked, winking at him. ‘I can be there to save you in case rabid man-who-lived fans mob you and blow your cover.’
Harry’s eyes widened and a smile began to play around his lips.
‘You know,’ he said, slipping his hands further down her waist, ‘I think I saw some of those rabid fans outside trying to force their way in.’ Harry leaned in towards her, voice low and his breath touching her lips. ‘I might need some saving right now.’
Ginny grinned and reached up to lace her hands around his neck. It wasn’t easy, loving Harry Potter, but she thought she was up to the challenge.